Historian, Former Ambassador, Human Rights Activist

With fighting surging in Basra and other parts of Iraq, the Government is, yet again, squirming out of holding an enquiry into how this whole mess got started. With 4,000 dead Americans and a current best estimate of 1,200,000 dead Iraqi’s, Tony Blair is taking a little time out from solving the Middle East conflict to to talk about ‘Faith and Globilisation’ at Westminster Abbey. Marvellous.

To get an update on how others in the inner circle of war initiators has prospered read Catherine Bennett here. However, even there one of the biggest beneficiaries of the WMD scam is not mentioned. John Scarlett, was promoted in May 2004 to be head of MI6. This followed his role in overseeing the ‘intelligence’ behind the dodgy dossier as chair of the Joint Intelligence Committee. Transparent corruption at the highest level.

This is definetely a long term Project for the New “choose your own” Century. So, if you are still at school and thinking of joining up for this never ending jolly foreign colonial escapade, better check this out first: http://www.beforeyousignup.info

Update: A British soldier was killed in Iraq in the early hours of this morning.

Update 2:Sounding out Tony Blair is going to try and ensure his appearance at Westminster Abbey is not a quiet event…

4 thoughts on “The Iraq Surge… Again”

The 4100 British troops at Basra airport are not doing anything that their leaders have stated they are supposed to be doing, nor anything Brown and Browne state they are doing – training Iraqi government forces, or backing up Iraqi government forces if there is an outbreak of fierce fighting (rather than expressions of unrest).

The Iraqi government forces currently fighting in the former British sector in the south are trained by the United States, and none of the British troops have left their base at the airport, despite widespread and major battles taking place in the last week and continuing today.

It looks as if they are there to prevent any full scale enquiry beginning into the war. As many reports suggest they are so few as to be barely able to defend themselves if seriously attacked, any pressure that can be brought on the New Labour regime to withdraw them should be applied.

I agree. Though I believe the army is positioned to defend the lifeline from Kuwait to Baghdad in the event of an American attack on Iran, which appears to be on the horizon. The current fighting around Bazra may be connected to such an attack, clearing the ground of potential enemy that could cut this vital supply line if Iran is threatened. The position of the British Army caught between the Iraqi resistance on one side and the advancing Iranians on the other looks pretty precarious.

I agree with you about the location of the British forces at Basra airport. I think they should be got out now before things get much worse, otherwise it's going to be a re-run of the Siege of the Kabul Residency in 1840 (during the First Afghan War) – "If anything occurs, for God's sake clear the passes quickly, that I might get away." (General Elphinstone, commander Kabul garrison).

I wonder who gets to play Dr William Brydon (the only European of an army of 4,500 men to reach safety in Jalalabad after the long retreat from Kabul)?

What almost drives me to dispair is the concept of 'humanitarian imperialism'. There is by now a vast literature on the history of European imperialism, yet people honestly seem to believe that we are sending are armies to invade and occupy foreign countries because we want to 'help' them. Coupled to this is the equally old and redundent conceit of the 'White man's burden'. What strikes one is how little has really changed underneath the surface. We are still fighting mindless savages who are resisting the blessings of modernity and progress. We slaughter them for their own good. We baptize them in a river of blood and save their immortal souls so they can walk, wide-eyed towards the nearest mall and shop like mad, like we do.